There's A City In China With Its Own Street Lane For People Who Can't Stop Staring At Their Phones

On Foreigner Street in Chongqing, China, there's a separate lane for people looking at their phones. News.cn
How many times have you bumped into someone while walking down the street because your face was buried in your phone?

Apparently this happens all too often in one Chinese city — so much so that an entire street lane has been set aside for those who can't stop staring at their phones.

You can find this lane on Foreigner Street in Chongqing, China, according to Engadget, which spotted the story via Chinese news publication News.cn. The lane was created to "reduce collisions" in the area due to the high number of tourists in the area, according to a translation of the Chinese article.

The street is divided in two halves, with one lane labeled "Cellphones, walk at your own risk" and the other marked "No cellphones."

This isn't the first time we've seen a dedicated lane for people who can't keep from peeking at their phones.

In June, National Geographic conducted an experiment in Washington D.C. by dividing a sidewalk half with one lane just for people who felt the need to look at their phone as they walked. The experiment was for an upcoming TV series on behavioral science called "Mind Over Masses," as Yahoo Tech reported.

It's unclear if the separate lane on Foreigner Street in China is part of a similar test or if its here to stay. But, as The Wall Street Journal first discovered, users on Chinese social forum Weibo seem to doubt whether the idea is actually practical. Here's what one Weibo user had to say:

"Is the goal here to encourage still more people to use their cellphones while walking?"